Established in 2008, this blog is an independent, common sense, look at challenges and opportunities in sports and financial investing, with occasional diversions as my mood takes me. I am not a tipster, nor is this a Profit and Loss report either. They are boring.

Tuesday, 12 September 2017

... to borrow the opening line of the Queen song Save Me, and while I shall soon be far from home, I'm hoping it's not in the state of undress that the protagonist in the song finds himself in.On Sunday night, I received an email from a reader which was extremely pleasing as he not only shared some data and thoughts with me, but also because it showed that at least one person enjoys the NCAAF and NFL posts.The email concluded with:

PS: The NFL road dogs system looks like a winner tonight. :)

Pride comes before a fall. At the time of my reply, the early matches were concluding, with three winners out of three, and I wrote:

For the NFL tonight I have Ravens, Giants, Seahawks, Colts, Jaguars, Raiders, Chargers and Saints.

Ravens won, Jaguars up 22, Raiders won - rest to come. I'm in good shape!

I should have said "this weekend" rather than "tonight" as the last two games were Monday Night games, but three winners at least out of the eight had me confident of a profitable start to the season.Unfortunately from a system perspective, after my investments were applied, the Raiders shortened to +1.5 and were no longer an 'official' selection, so I was down to two winners with five games to come.After that promising early start, things went downhill fast, which will teach me to gloat. The New York Giants, Seattle Seahawks and Indianapolis Colts all failed to cover in the later games on Sunday, while the Monday night games had one loss and one push. The New Orleans Saints were soundly beaten by the Minnesota Vikings while the San Diego, excuse me, Los Angeles, Chargers managed a push with a late surge from 17 points down, which felt like a win of course.

About Me

I have had a life-long interest in sports and after studying Pure Mathematics with Statistics at secondary school, have been fascinated by odds and probability.
The first system I came up with was a simple one - back the favourite and double up after a loss until a winner. Simple enough in theory, and I told my Dad about it. Not being a betting man himself, he ran it by some of his colleagues, and came home to tell me that it wouldn’t work because a long losing run would mean that the bank would be empty. Then there was always the possibility that the winner would be returned at odds-on, meaning that the total returns would not match the outlay. Not what a ten year old wants to hear! Only slightly daunted, I then went on a search for the Holy Grail, the secret to riches that I knew was out there somewhere. Finally in 2004 I stumbled across an article about Betting Exchanges and four years on I am able to make a steady profit. I am at that age where I can start thinking about retirement and anything I make from trading sports will bring that day forward.